Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? E-Book

• Herausgeber: Crossway
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 1107

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2012

Beschreibung

Is historical accuracy an indispensable part of the Bible's storyline, or is Scripture only concerned with theological truths? As progressive evangelicals threaten to reduce the Bible's jurisdiction by undermining its historical claims, every Christian who cares about the integrity of Scripture must be prepared to answer this question. Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? offers a firm defense of Scripture's legitimacy and the theological implications of modern and postmodern approaches that teach otherwise. In this timely and timeless collection of essays, scholars from diverse areas of expertise lend strong arguments in support of the doctrine of inerrancy. Contributors explore how the specific challenges of history, authenticity, and authority are answered in the text of the Old and New Testaments as well as how the Bible is corroborated by philosophy and archaeology. With contributions from respected scholars—including Allan Millard, Craig Blomberg, Graham Cole, Michael Haykin, Robert Yarbrough, and Darrell Bock—Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? arms Christians with fresh insight, arguments, and language with which to defend Scripture's historical accuracy against a culture and academy skeptical of those claims.

Leseprobe

“Standing athwart the tide of strident voices currently demanding that we abandon confidence in the truthfulness and reliability of the Bible, the chapters in this volume constitute a defense of historic Christian confessionalism on the nature of Scripture. Mercifully, however, they are not mere regurgitations of past positions. Rather, they are informed, competent, and sometimes creative contributions that urgently deserve the widest circulation. In months and years to come, I shall repeatedly refer students and pastors to this collection.”

D. A. Carson, Research Professor of New Testament, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School

“Few Christian convictions are of as pervasive importance as the absolute perfection of Scripture—and few convictions fall under more perennial criticism. Hence the need for this volume, which seeks to defend the evangelical doctrine of biblical inerrancy against scholars who argue that in accommodating his truth to human understanding, God has made his Word susceptible to error. Here James Hoffmeier, Dennis Magary, and a broad range of learned colleagues take seriously the self-witness of Scripture and respond to some of the latest, hardest objections to inerrancy by providing clear, comprehensive, persuasive, and charitable answers. Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? is an invaluable resource for any student of Scripture who doubts the doctrine of inerrancy or has serious questions about the historical reliability of the Bible.”

Philip G. Ryken, President, Wheaton College

“To scholars unconvinced of the classical Christian doctrine of Holy Scripture, Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? offers a challenge both substantive in its argumentation and respectful in its tone. To scholars convinced of this doctrine, this volume models how to advance the argument on a multidisciplinary, evidentialist basis. We owe the editors and authors a debt of gratitude.”

Ray Ortlund, Lead Pastor, Immanuel Church, Nashville, Tennessee

“The debate over biblical inerrancy is a crucial issue for evangelicals. Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? is an important response to this challenge, and its essays, written by leading evangelical scholars, present a robust defense of the reliability of the historical narratives of the Bible. The book makes a compelling case that holding to inerrancy does not mean one must avoid examining the issues raised by critical scholarship, but rather the accuracy of Scripture can itself be the conclusion of a reasoned and critical examination of the evidence.”

Michelle Lee-Barnewall, Associate Professor of Biblical and Theological Studies, Biola University; author, Paul, the Stoics, and the Body of Christ

“This is a book that has been sorely needed. The Bible has long been under attack from those outside evangelical faith, and now more recently from those supposedly inside. Here in one volume the questions are addressed in a comprehensive way, including theological, historical-critical, and archaeological issues. Written with an irenic tone—and yet confronting the questions directly—this book will surely take a prominent place on the shelves of all those who love the Bible and look for solid answers to give to its detractors. The editors are to be commended for bringing the book to fruition and for their breadth of vision in organizing it.”

John Oswalt, Distinguished Professor of Old Testament, Asbury Theological Seminary

“James Hoffmeier and Dennis Magary have assembled a first-rate team of evangelical writers to join them in exploring the historical issues related to the interpretation of Holy Scripture and the formation of Christian theology. Each chapter makes a significant contribution to this comprehensive and focused volume—which both affirms and defends the complete truthfulness and full authority of the Bible while fully engaging the questions and challenges raised by modern and postmodern approaches to biblical interpretation. Informative and winsome, this impressive work will be immensely helpful for a generation of students, pastors, and scholars alike.”

David S. Dockery, President, Union University

“How evangelicals view the Bible has been, and continues to be, under attack. This volume effectively defends the Bible’s historicity and adeptly explains why it matters. Any pastor or person teaching and defending the Bible will be greatly helped by this book.”

Alistair Begg, Senior Pastor, Parkside Church, Cleveland, Ohio

“Today, some so-called evangelicals have questioned and outright denied the full extent of the inerrancy, authority, and trustworthiness of God’s Word, claiming it may apply to faith and practice but not to history and science. As disturbing as these claims are against the Scriptures, I give thanks to God that they have prompted an excellent response, so that we now have a much stronger foundation for affirming the inerrancy of God’s Word, including matters of history. Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? is one of the best and most thorough treatments in defense of the Bible as completely true and trustworthy in the realm of history. It is a much-needed antidote to some so-called evangelicals’ unhealthy (and inaccurate) view of inerrancy. In matters relating to the doctrine of the Scriptures, this will be the book I recommend to pastors and leaders. It will serve them and the church well, and deserves the highest of commendations!”

Gregory C. Strand, Director of Biblical Theology and Credentialing, Evangelical Free Church of America

“Here is a collection of first-rate essays written by an international team of scholars, each affirming what must be called the historic Christian view of Holy Scripture—that the Bible, God’s Word written, is trustworthy and totally true in all that it affirms. Rather than simply rehearsing platitudes of the past, this volume advances the argument in the light of current debate and recent challenges. A magisterial undertaking to be reckoned with.”

Timothy George, Founding Dean, Beeson Divinity School; General Editor, Reformation Commentary on Scripture

“In recent decades evangelicals have felt increasing pressure to abandon their high views of Scripture—a pressure that comes not only from scholars outside their circles, but also from some inside. This volume represents a welcome response to both, but especially to the latter. The contributors represent evangelical scholarship at its best as they address critical challenges with clarity and conviction, even while keeping their tone civil and charitable. This book will serve as a handy reference tool for students, pastors, and scholars who need a fair and responsible treatment of the evidence and clear declaration of their conclusions.”

Daniel I. Block, Gunther H. Knoedler Professor of Old Testament, Wheaton College; author, The Gospel according to Moses: Theological and Ethical Reflections on the Book of Deuteronomy

“Twenty-first-century hubris insists on immediate answers from a Book of great antiquity that is fundamentally about God’s intervention in human history. Yet even with advances in scientific archaeological method and modern scholarship, there is still much to learn about the Bible’s ancient setting, language, history, and sociopolitical context. This book engages honestly with a number of thorny issues concerning the history and evidence for key biblical narratives. Its propositions are robustly defended in a clear yet scholarly fashion, making it accessible to informed lay and academic readers alike. I commend it to anyone seeking an orthodox evangelical perspective on the flash points in current debates about the historicity of the Scriptures.”

Karin Sowada, CEO, Anglican Deaconess Ministries Ltd.; Hon. Research Associate, Macquarie University

“Singapore Bible College was founded in 1952 to uphold the authority of God’s Word when the Scriptures were under severe attack from the liberals of that era. Today, we are a living testimony to the effectiveness and authority of God’s Word as we expound a Bible-based theological education. The mocking of the Word of God did not liberate people from what the liberals claimed to be superstition or outdated scholarship. But it did destroy the faith of many poorly grounded believers, confused the church concerning her mission and purpose, created tension in the mission field, and set the church backward on many fronts in Asia and elsewhere. James Hoffmeier and Dennis Magary have assembled an able team of evangelical scholars to address and defend the issues of the authority of God’s Word from theological, biblical, and archaeological perspectives. They are not afraid to face the issues head-on in a comprehensive and thorough manner, yet with the right spirit. I hope this book will help many students of the Scriptures to have a deeper conviction of the authoritative and inerrant Word of God.”

Albert Ting, Principal, Singapore Bible College

“This volume well documents the analysis and evidence integral to understanding the role of historical data in biblical understanding. The authors are to be congratulated for writing a book that would withstand rigorous cross-examination!”

Mark Lanier, President, Christian Trial Lawyers Association; author of numerous legal books and articles; owner, Lanier Theological Library

“To the credit of its editors and authors, this book is not so much a reaction to the recent statements of Peter Enns and Kenton Sparks on biblical inerrancy, which called it forth, but an apologetic response to their works. To that effect, it is not a monument to the doctrine, but rather an advancement of its method and intent.”

C. Hassell Bullock, Pastor, Warren Park Presbyterian Church, Cicero, Illinois; Franklin S. Dyrness Professor of Biblical Studies Emeritus, Wheaton College

“This is a timely work, both in the sense that it addresses an emerging issue—a loss of confidence in the historicity of the Bible—and in the sense that its authors are conversant in the current state of the debate. The topics discussed include all the essentials: the foundational theological issues, the major source-critical and historical-critical questions, and matters arising from archaeology. This book will be a valuable resource for both scholars and students.”

Duane A. Garrett, Professor of Old Testament, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary; author, A Modern Grammar for Biblical Hebrew and Amos: A Handbook on the Hebrew Text

“This is a brilliant response to evangelical skeptics such as Peter Enns and Kenton Sparks, and, in a broader sense, also to mainstream skeptics such as Philip Davies, Keith Whitelam, or Robert Coote. The list of contributors is a stellar lineup of first-rate scholars in their disciplines who defend the traditional, orthodox view of Scripture as historically reliable in sophisticated and convincing ways. Even those who might remain unconvinced of the book’s main argument will have to rethink their positions. I highly recommend this work.”

David M. Howard Jr., Professor of Old Testament, Bethel University, St. Paul, Minnesota

“This book takes us to the front lines of many of the contemporary confrontations in critical scholarship, addressing the skeptics head-on. A host of able defenders contend for the trustworthiness of the Bible in the face of critical challenges and fairly criticize some of the ‘assured results’ of biblical criticism—opening the way for a more confident faith. Only the Holy Spirit himself can fully confirm the truth of God’s Word, but he can use books like this to confound the doubter and affirm the faithful.”

Bill Kynes, Senior Pastor, Cornerstone Evangelical Free Church, Annandale, Virginia; author, A Christology of Solidarity

“This is a thoughtful and heartening response to Sparks and other progressive evangelicals who believe the time has come to move beyond what they perceive to be an outdated view of Scripture’s inerrancy. Those seeking to rightly handle the word of truth (2 Tim. 2:15) will find here methodological, philosophical, theological, archaeological, and geographical resources for navigating the historical context of Scripture that call attention to its divine origins. Hoffmeier and Magary have provided a great service to the academy and church in this scholarly compilation of evangelical writers who conserve the tradition of the plenary inspiration and inerrancy of the Old and New Testament Scriptures. Soli Deo gloria.”

Laura C. Miguélez, Adjunct Professor of Theology, Wheaton College

Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? A Critical Appraisal of Modern and Postmodern Approaches to Scripture

Copyright © 2012 by James K. Hoffmeier and Dennis R. Magary Published by Crossway                     1300 Crescent Street                     Wheaton, Illinois 60187

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher, except as provided for by USA copyright law.

Cover design: Tobias’ Outerwear for Books Cover image: Getty Images Interior design and typesetting: Lakeside Design Plus

First printing 2012 Printed in the United States of America

Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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Scripture quotations marked TNIV are taken from the Holy Bible, Today’s New International Version. TNIV®. Copyright © 2001, 2005 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.

All emphases in Scripture quotations have been added by the authors.

Trade paperback ISBN:        

978-1-4335-2571-1

ePub ISBN:

978-1-4335-2574-2

PDF ISBN:

978-1-4335-2572-8

Mobipocket ISBN:

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Do historical matters matter to faith? : a critical appraisal of modern and postmodern approaches to Scripture / edited by James K. Hoffmeier and Dennis R. Magary ; foreword by John D. Woodbridge.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-4335-2571-1 (tp)

1. Bible—History of biblical events. 2. Bible—Evidences, authority, etc. I. Hoffmeier, James Karl, 1951–

II. Magary, Dennis Robert, 1951–

BS635.D56 2012

220.6—dc23

2011037802

Crossway is a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

In Memory of Donald J. Wiseman

October 1918–February 2010

CONTENTS

Foreword by John D. Woodbridge

Preface

Abbreviations

Part 1: Biblical, Systematic, and Historical Theology

 1 Religious Epistemology, Theological Interpretation of Scripture, and Critical Biblical Scholarship: A Theologian’s Reflections

THOMAS H. MCCALL

 2 The Peril of a “Historyless” Systematic Theology

GRAHAM A. COLE

 3 The Divine Investment in Truth: Toward a Theological Account of Biblical Inerrancy

MARK D. THOMPSON

 4 “These Things Happened”: Why a Historical Exodus Is Essential for Theology

JAMES K. HOFFMEIER

 5 Fundamentum et Columnam Fidei Nostrae: Irenaeus on the Perfect and Saving Nature of the Scriptures

MICHAEL A. G. HAYKIN

Part 2: The Old Testament and Issues of History, Authenticity, and Authority

 6 Pentateuchal Criticism and the Priestly Torah

RICHARD E. AVERBECK

 7 Old Testament Source Criticism: Some Methodological Miscues

ROBERT B. CHISHOLM JR.

 8 Word Distribution as an Indicator of Authorial Intention: A Study of Genesis 1:1–2:3

ROBERT D. BERGEN

 9 The Culture of Prophecy and Writing in the Ancient Near East

JOHN W. HILBER

10 Isaiah, Isaiahs, and Current Scholarship

RICHARD L. SCHULTZ

11 Daniel in Babylon: An Accurate Record?

ALAN R. MILLARD

12 A Critical-Realistic Reading of the Psalm Titles: Authenticity, Inspiration, and Evangelicals

WILLEM A. VANGEMERENAND JASON STANGHELLE

13 The Old Testament as Cultural Memory

JENS BRUUN KOFOED

Part 3: The New Testament and Issues of History, Authenticity, and Authority

14 God’s Word in Human Words: Form-Critical Reflections

ROBERT W. YARBROUGH

15 A Constructive Traditional Response to New Testament Criticism

CRAIG L. BLOMBERG

16 Precision and Accuracy: Making Distinctions in the Cultural Context That Give Us Pause in Pitting the Gospels against Each Other

DARRELL L. BOCK

17 Paul, Timothy, and Titus: The Assumption of a Pseudonymous Author and of Pseudonymous Recipients in the Light of Literary, Theological, and Historical Evidence

ECKHARD J. SCHNABEL

18 Saint Paul on Cyprus: The Transformation of an Apostle

THOMAS W. DAVIS

Part 4: The Old Testament and Archaeology

19 Enter Joshua: The “Mother of Current Debates” in Biblical Archaeology

JOHN M. MONSON

20 Yahweh’s “Wife” and Belief in One God in the Old Testament

RICHARD S. HESS

21 New Excavations at Khirbet Qeiyafa and the Early History of Judah

MICHAEL G. HASEL

22 The Archaeology of David and Solomon: Method or Madness?

STEVEN M. ORTIZ

Contributors

FOREWORD

JOHN D. WOODBRIDGE

Most of us like invitations to consider fresh opportunities. The present book constitutes a winsome invitation for its readers to consider a very significant claim: the Bible’s historical narratives are trustworthy. The narratives correspond to what happened in real time and in real places.

The opportunity is “fresh” especially for those readers who doubt the reliability of Scripture’s historical accounts. The invitation suggests that they should take a second look at the claim that the Bible’s historical narratives are indeed trustworthy. This assertion has significant entailments for Christianity itself. Christians believe the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ is at the heart of their faith. If the resurrection did not take place in real history, then as the apostle Paul wrote, our faith is groundless, and we are still in our sins: “If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain” (1 Cor. 15:14).

Within the last thirty or forty years, skepticism about the accuracy of the biblical documents has affected the ways scholars have pursued the academic study of the Israelite religion, Old Testament theology, and biblical theology.

To address this skepticism, Professors James Hoffmeier and Dennis Magary have assembled a group of distinguished scholars to tackle a good number of the “hard case” questions contributing to the prevalent skepticism in certain circles. Not only do these scholars take the questions seriously, but they also avoid offering contrived or beside-the-point responses to the queries. Readers are invited to assess for themselves whether the responses satisfactorily engage the matters under consideration.

The publication of Kenton Sparks’s work God’s Word in Human Words created the immediate occasion for the writing of Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? In his book Professor Sparks, an accomplished scholar in his own right, offers a sustained critique of the doctrine of biblical inerrancy, particularly as it relates to the historical reliability of Scripture. Whereas some “higher critics” of Scripture never espoused the doctrine of biblical inerrancy, Sparks once upheld the belief. Now, with missionary zeal he hopes to persuade evangelical Christians who are inerrantists that they should follow his lead, adopt his thoughtful appropriation of higher criticism, and acknowledge that the Bible contains historical errors. From Sparks’s point of view, these moves neither compromise a person’s good standing as an evangelical Christian nor by implication undermine essential evangelical doctrines. Evangelical Christians should recognize, he insists, that reputable scholarship sustains his view that the biblical narratives are errant.

By contrast, the authors of the present book, a number of whom are world-class archaeologists, calmly extend the invitation by implication to Professor Sparks, and others, to reconsider the validity of his errancy proposal. There is a simple reason to do so. These scholars demonstrate that Sparks’s arguments do not possess the persuasive power he attributes to them.

I would add that the witness of many Christians in the past indicates that Sparks’s proposal is not as heuristic for evangelical theology as he imagines. He is not the first to defend the errancy position. In earlier ages Christian scholars often rejected equivalent versions of Sparks’s proposal as perilous doctrinal innovations. These varieties of the errancy view departed from the Augustinian teaching about the Bible’s complete infallibility (for faith and practice and history and science), which constituted the central church doctrine of the Western churches. For his part, Augustine did not countenance the idea of errors in Scripture. His viewpoint constituted standard church teaching for centuries. The Roman Catholic theologian Hans Küng observed, “St. Augustine’s influence in regard to inspiration and inerrancy prevailed throughout the Middle Ages and right into the modern age.”1

As late as the nineteenth century, the Roman Catholic Church formally defended the inerrancy of Scripture. In Providentissimus Deus Encyclical of Pope Leo XIII on the Study of Holy Scripture (Nov. 18, 1893), Leo XIII sharply criticized those who limited the inerrancy of Scripture to matters of faith and morals.

But it is absolutely wrong and forbidden either to narrow inspiration to certain parts only of Holy Scripture, or to admit that the sacred writer has erred. For the system of those who, in order to rid themselves of these difficulties, do not hesitate to concede that divine inspiration regards the things of faith and morals, and nothing beyond, because (as they wrongly think) in a question of the truth or falsehood of a passage, we should consider not so much what God has said as the reason and purpose which He had in mind in saying it—this system cannot be tolerated.2

Later in the encyclical, he wrote, “It follows that those who maintain that an error is possible in any genuine passage of the sacred writings, either pervert the Catholic notion of inspiration, or make God the author of such error.”3 He cited passages from Augustine as Patristic warrants for his teaching.

Whereas Professor Sparks indicates that Scripture contains errors, in a letter (AD 405) to Faustus the Manichean, Augustine indicated that Scripture is “free from error.”

I confess to your Charity that I have learned to yield this respect and honor only to the canonical books of Scripture: of these alone do I most firmly believe that the authors were completely free from error. And if in these writings I am perplexed by anything which appears to me opposed to truth, I do not hesitate to suppose that either the manuscript is faulty, or the translator has not caught the meaning of what was said, or I myself have failed to understand.

Whereas Sparks believes there are no negative entailments for acknowledging the existence of errors in Scripture, Augustine proffered quite the contrary sentiment:

It seems to me that the most disastrous consequences must follow upon our believing that anything false is found in the sacred books; that is to say that the men by whom the Scripture has been given to us and committed to writing, did put down in these books anything false. . . . If you once admit into such a high sanctuary of authority one false statement . . . , there will not be left a single sentence of those books, which, if appearing to any one difficult in practice or hard to believe, may not by the same fatal rule be explained away as a statement, in which intentionally, . . . the author declared what was not true.4

Whereas Sparks believed that it is not necessarily important to seek the careful harmonization of biblical texts, Augustine indicated that unbelievers used “contradictions” in an attempt to overthrow the Christian religion. In discussing the harmony of the Gospel accounts, Augustine averred:

And in order to carry out this design to a successful conclusion, we must prove that the writers in question do not stand in any antagonism to each other. For those adversaries are in the habit of adducing this as the primary allegation in all their vain objections, namely that the evangelists are not in harmony with each other.5

Like Professors Jack Rogers, Donald McKim, and Peter Enns, Professor Sparks mistakenly thinks that God accommodated Scripture to the faulty worldviews and perspectival human limitations of the biblical writers. Given the “human authorship” of Scripture, it necessarily contains errors. Sparks writes, “To attribute error to God is surely heresy, but to deny the errant human elements in Scripture may verge on a kind of docetism.”6 He advocates a form of “accommodation” but unwittingly identifies it with what Richard Muller and Glen Sunshine have labeled a Socinian doctrine. Socinian accommodation is quite a distinct teaching from the Augustinian doctrine of accommodation. For Augustine and those who followed his lead, such as John Calvin, God accommodated Scripture to the weakness of our understanding, not to the potentially errant cosmologies of the biblical writers. Thus Scripture is written in the language of appearance—the way we see things. Scripture often presents things simply so we can understand it. But Scripture remains truthful in its simplicity. The Holy Spirit’s inspiration of Scripture guarantees that the biblical authors, despite their sinfulness and humanness, wrote without error.

Sparks mistakenly states that evangelicals who affirm the doctrine of biblical inerrancy have no room in their theology for the doctrine of biblical accommodation: “Where evangelicals adhere strictly to certain conceptions of inerrancy, which disallow even the slightest human errors in the biblical text, this will oblige them in principle (or so it would seem) to reject the conceptual validity of accommodation altogether.”7 Perhaps some evangelicals do reject the teaching, but many others, such as J. I. Packer, heartily embrace the Augustinian definition of accommodation.

By contrast, most evangelicals agree in rejecting categorically the Socinian version of the doctrine. In an earlier day, for example, the Methodist John Wesley used especially strong language in criticizing a similar proposal to Sparks’s contention that the Bible’s history contains errors owing to its accommodated character. In his View of the Internal Evidences of the Christian Religion, Soame Jenyns, one of Wesley’s contemporaries, had adopted a Socinian definition of accommodation. Jenyns claimed that the biblical writers had recounted stories “accommodated to the ignorance and superstition of the times and countries in which they had been written.” He continued, “In the sciences of history, geography, astronomy and philosophy, they appear to have been no better instructed than others, and therefore were not less liable to be mis-lead by the errors and prejudices of the times and countries in which they lived.” Wesley would have none of this proposal and countered:

He [Jenyns] is undoubtedly a fine writer; but whether he is a Christian, Deist, or Atheist I cannot tell. If he is a Christian, he betrays his own cause by averring, that “all Scripture is given by inspiration of God; but the writers of it were sometimes left to themselves, and consequently made some mistakes.” Nay, if there be any mistakes in the Bible, there may be as well a thousand. If there be one falsehood in that book, it did not come from the God of Truth.8

Charles Hodge lamented that a similar Socinian understanding of accommodation informed the writings of Johann Salomo Semler, often touted as the “Father of German higher criticism.” Semler proposed that scholars should engage in the “free search” for a canon within a canon of Scripture in order to identify the “authentic” word of God. In this quest, scholars should dismiss the cultural dross of biblical writings as error laden. Hodge argued that Semler’s approach to studying Scripture had subverted much of German theology in the late eighteenth century.

Sparks’s proposal and similar positions have been frequently weighed and found wanting in the history of the Christian churches. Not only does his viewpoint depart from a traditional Christian understanding of Scripture’s truthfulness, but it likewise does not accord with Scripture’s self-attestation about its truthfulness or trustworthiness.

Sparks may dismiss these comments as misguided. But he has the burden of explaining why in fact they are such. Certainly, my comments are not intended to raise any questions about Professor Sparks’s personal faith. Rather they constitute an invitation for him to reconsider his account of the history of biblical authority and hermeneutics—an account that seriously misconstrues the history of accommodation.9

Sparks might respond that when all is said and done, the basic thrust of his argument does not focus on the accuracy of his history of biblical interpretation but centers upon the reliability of the historical narratives. In this context, the present volume assumes its undoubted significance. The authors of Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? address in a straightforward manner the challenges Sparks offers to the trustworthiness of the Bible’s historical narratives. They honor Professor Sparks’s scholarship by taking his proposal seriously.

After all, is Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? not a fresh invitation for those who doubt the reliability of the historical narratives in Scripture? By portraying the import of this volume in this fashion, I am assuming that people of good faith are open to changing their viewpoints on the basis of the evidence. Certainly, Sparks envisioned wooing inerrantists to adopt his position through the arguments he posited. But errantists sometimes become inerrantists after further research and reflection. Robert Yarbrough recounts the story of Eta Linnemann, a renowned Bultmannian higher critic who late in her career embraced the doctrine of Scripture’s full trustworthiness.

It is my hope not only that this volume will strengthen the convictions of evangelical Christians who believe that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God (including its historical narratives), but also that it will serve as an attractive invitation to those readers who have dismissed this stance to reconsider their commitment to biblical errancy. Should they affirm the doctrine of biblical inerrancy, their new doctrinal commitment would accord with the central doctrine of Scripture among Western churches and with Scripture’s own teaching about its truthfulness. They will be able to teach the full counsel of the Word of God without having first to discriminate between what is authentic Scripture and what is inauthentic, error-prone cultural or mythic dross. Engaging the well-informed and lucid arguments of this book is a fresh opportunity not to be missed.

1 Hans Küng, Infallible? An Enquiry (London: Collins, 1971), 174.

2 Pope Leo XIII, Providentissimus Deus, sec. 18.

3 Ibid., sec. 25.

4 Augustine, Letters of St. Augustine 28.3.

5 Augustine, Harmony of the Gospels 1.7.10.

6 Kenton L. Sparks, God’s Word in Human Words: An Evangelical Appropriation of Critical Biblical Scholarship (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008), 256.

7 Ibid., 247.

8 John Wesley, Journal, July 24, 1776.

9 See Glenn Sunshine, “Accommodation Historically Considered,” in “But My Words Will Never Pass Away”: The Enduring Authority of the Christian Scriptures, ed. D. A. Carson (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012).

PREFACE

During the past thirty years biblical and theological scholarship has had to cope with many serious challenges to orthodox and evangelical understanding of Scripture. In addition to the Enlightenment positivist readings of the Bible (which continue with us after more than two centuries), we can now add postmodern literary approaches that treat the biblical narratives solely as literature that should be read as fiction. One of the consequences of this development has been the minimalist-maximalist historiography debate. The generally skeptical mood toward much of the history of the Bible (e.g., the Genesis ancestors of ancient Israel, the Egyptian sojourn, the exodus, the wilderness wanderings, the conquest of Canaan, and the united monarchy) has naturally taken its toll on the academic study of Israelite religion, Old Testament theology, and biblical theology, as these disciplines are intimately connected to history.

These two radically distinct paradigms for analyzing the Old Testament, despite the methodological differences, come to similar conclusions regarding the historical trustworthiness of the Hebrew narratives from Genesis to 1 Kings. J. Maxwell Miller and John H. Hayes well represent the “modern” (yet two-centuries-old!) approach when they opine:

We hold that the main story line of Genesis–Joshua—creation, pre-Flood patriarchs, great Flood, second patriarchal age, entrance into Egypt, twelve tribes descended from the twelve brothers, escape from Egypt, complete collections of laws and religious instructions handed down at Mt. Sinai, forty years of wandering in the wilderness, miraculous conquests of Canaan, . . .—is an artificial and theologically influenced literary construct.1

Adherents of the postmodern hermeneutic arrive at nearly the same conclusion. Thomas Thompson serves as a representative for this model: “Biblical Israel, as an element of tradition and story, such as the murmuring stories in the wilderness, . . . is a theological and literary creation.”2 Similarly, Philip Davies seemingly offers an obituary on the age of Moses, declaring, “Most biblical scholars accept that there was no historical counterpart to this epoch, and most intelligent biblical archaeologists accept this too.”3 Traditional critical scholars are dismayed by these extreme positions, as is evidenced in the title of a recent article by Siegfried Herrmann, “The Devaluation of the Old Testament as a Historical Source.”4

New Testament studies has not been immune to scholarship that has challenged traditional readings of the Bible. There were the quest for the historical Jesus that began a century ago with Albert Schweitzer and Rudolf Bultmann’s demythologizing approach to the Gospels, both of which treated the New Testament as a suspect document historically. Just as Old Testament scholars have been dominated by the radical stances of the historical minimalists in recent decades, the field of New Testament studies has had do deal with the Jesus Seminar and its dismissive claims of the Gospels with respect to the birth, life, and death of Jesus.

Evangelical biblical scholars have rightly rejected the extreme positions of historical minimalism, whether in Old Testament or New Testament studies. The rise of postmodern approaches, despite the many negative aspects, has detracted from the ascendancy of traditional higher criticism as practiced in the academy since the nineteenth century. One consequence of these competing approaches to biblical studies is that there is no longer a consensus among critical scholars; rather, a plurality of approaches is in vogue. Given the loss of a consensus on the academic study of the Bible, it is surprising that some evangelicals would challenge their colleagues to embrace the findings of critical scholarship, to dismiss the historicity of many events in both Testaments, and then to insist that intellectual honesty requires an admission that the Bible contains many errors and inconsistencies. It goes without saying, in the view of some, that the doctrine of inerrancy should be radically revised, if not laid to rest. “Progressive evangelicals,” as they have identified themselves, are raising some important questions regarding recent academic trends and traditional evangelical views of Scripture. They advocate looking to Scripture purely for theology while setting aside questions of history in the name of bending the knee to the latest conclusions of critical biblical scholarship—a new manifestation of an old neoorthodoxy.

Peter Enns’s book Inspiration and Incarnation5 has raised some good questions about the relationship between ancient Near Eastern literature and the Bible and inspiration. It was, however, Kenton Sparks’s more recent book God’s Word in Human Words6 that turned out to be the catalyst for this collection of essays. While both books focus largely on the Old Testament, and both of these scholars are Old Testament scholars, they do treat New Testament and theological issues. Sparks’s book is the more provocative, as he feels that the way around the “contradictions” and “errors” in the Bible is to accept source-critical theories that the Bible preserves multiple traditions within a narrative or among different books (e.g., Kings and Chronicles, or the Synoptic Gospels and John).

This collaborative book is an outgrowth of a panel discussion by faculty members of the Department of Old Testament and Semitic Languages at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in February 2009. The noon colloquium organized by the Old Testament department was attended by almost eighty students. Dennis Magary, chair of the department, moderated the meeting, and Willem VanGemeren, Richard Averbeck, and James Hoffmeier offered appraisals, followed by a period of questions and answers. Students indicated much appreciation that we were addressing some of these issues, and many expressed the hope that we would publish our thoughts and critique. Not only were Old Testament students present, but a broad range of students from other departments and programs participated, and the questions raised during the seminar and subsequent to it reflected the breadth of Sparks’s book, which treats problems with the Old and New Testaments, but also theology and church history.

The questions our students were asking regarding critical issues and the Bible, especially issues identified by Enns and Sparks, prompted Drs. Magary and Hoffmeier to organize this book and to expand the list of contributors to include a broad range of scholars who represent the fields of Old and New Testament studies, archaeology, theology, and church history, using their respective specializations to address these issues head on. Our desire is to offer thoughtful, substantive responses to questions raised by critical scholars, regardless of their theological orientation, rather than ad hominem retorts. While this book will place a great deal of emphasis on the Old Testament and archaeology, there will also be chapters on the New Testament (especially touching on synoptic problems and the New Testament view of the Old Testament) and what happens to biblical and systematic theology when history is dismissed.

Sparks’s book God’s Word in Human Words reads like a reprise of James Barr’s Fundamentalism,7 especially his attack on evangelical/conservative biblical scholars (see esp. chap. 5). Sparks resuscitates Barr’s caricature of evangelical scholars, which was outdated and inaccurate in the 1970s, a caricature that portrayed evangelicals as not really understanding critical scholarly methods because they were trained in theologically conservative institutions, or as taking the easy path of archaeology and Near Eastern studies in order to avoid dealing with critical issues raised by critical scholarship. Barr asserted, “Probably none of the writers of conservative evangelical literature on the Bible who are actual professional biblical scholars can be found to be so completely negative towards the main trend in biblical scholarship as are those like Kitchen who look on the subject from the outside.”8 This elitist view is clearly a broadside against scholars who are looking at the Old Testament (in particular) from the perspective of Near Eastern studies. It is as if only when one agrees with the “assured results” of critical scholarship can one be treated as a “professional biblical scholar.”

Equally condescending is Sparks’s recent pronouncement that “many fundamentalists avoided these difficulties by majoring in ‘safe’ disciplines (text criticism, Greek classics, and Near Eastern studies) or by studying in institutions where critical issues could be avoided (especially in conservative Jewish Schools and in British universities).”9 (The contributors of this book who did their doctoral work in British universities—Aberdeen, Oxford, and Cambridge—would hardly agree with this assessment!) The readers need only to review the list of contributors to see where they completed their PhDs, and it will be abundantly clear that the vast majority worked in secular and critical contexts and had to deal directly with critical issues. In fact, even in the context of Near Eastern studies, the critical approaches of Altstestamentlers were a part of the curriculum.

The writers in this volume who use archaeological materials as a vehicle for understanding the context of a passage of Scripture and treat them as tools for interpreting biblical texts are all practicing field archaeologists who work with both the biblical and many cognate languages as well. Three of the authors were students of William G. Dever, the dean of North American Syro-Palestinian archaeology, who in the 1970s and 1980s chastised conservative biblical scholars for being “armchair” archaeologists who lacked field training and, therefore, the requisite tools for having the proper conversation between archaeology and texts. Thomas Davis, Steven Ortiz, and Michael Hasel studied with Dever because they were eager to become professional archaeologists in order to work alongside biblical studies in a responsible way.

Many of the great biblical and Near Eastern scholars of the past fifty years (e.g., William F. Albright, Cyrus Gordon, Donald Wiseman, William Hallo, and Kenneth Kitchen) considered the contextual materials to be vital tools for interpreting the Old Testament, a position taken by many of the contributors to this volume. It is hardly an easy and safe approach as, in addition to working with the Hebrew of the Old Testament and the various literary approaches used in biblical studies, there are the demands of knowing cognate languages and ancient Near Eastern history, religion, and culture. Having a working knowledge of all these fields is no easy task (and raises other questions and challenges to faith and theology), but it is an extremely rewarding and valuable way of reading the Bible. Furthermore, the scholars mentioned above saw the ancient Near Eastern contextual approach to offer an external method for evaluating critical theories that were formulated about the Bible in Western universities rather than in the Semitic world where the biblical text originated. What is curious about Barr’s and Sparks’s view on those who come at the Bible “from the outside” is that they seem so certain about the conclusions of (objective) critical scholarship (despite its constant shifting of positions and ever-increasing number of newer critical approaches) that they do not welcome an analytical evaluation of their own guild’s cherished “critical” scholarship. This is hardly a scientific or intellectually honest position when exculpatory evidence is produced against their charges. It seems, rather, that there is a special pleading for methodologies that have been seriously challenged in recent years (as some of the essays in this volume show) from within the guild itself. Postmodern critical scholars of the past twenty to thirty years have done more damage to the assured results of Enlightenment critical theories than all the evangelical scholars of the last century.

We offer this book to help address some of the questions raised about the historicity, accuracy, and inerrancy of the Bible by colleagues within our faith community, as well as those outside it. There will be a special emphasis placed on matters of history and the historicity of biblical narratives, both Old and New Testaments, as this seems presently to be a burning issue for theology and faith. Hence, we begin with a group of essays that deal with theological matters before moving on to topics in the Old Testament, the New Testament, and archaeology.

It is always difficult when individuals attack something or someone near and dear. When the stakes are as high as they are in the present dialogue, language can become strident. Motives can all too easily be misunderstood or misconstrued. We seek not to impugn but to inspire. It is our hope that the essays in this volume will engage the issues and their proponents with the grace and Christian character with which the late Donald J. Wiseman, the scholar in whose memory we dedicate this book, went about his work. Just about two years ago, Donald passed away, leaving a wonderful legacy as a biblical and Near Eastern scholar (a key figure in the NIV translation committee, a founder of Tyndale House in Cambridge, a writer of Old Testament commentaries, and a contributing Assyriologist) and as a churchman and academic mentor. He was a gracious and kind gentleman whose irenic spirit we should all emulate.

1 J. Maxwell Miller and John H. Hayes, A History of Ancient Israel and Judah (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1986), 78.

2 Thomas L. Thompson, The Mythic Past: Biblical Archaeology and the Myth of Israel (London: Basic Books, 1999).

3 Philip Davies, “The Intellectual, the Archaeologists and the Bible,” in The Land I Will Show You: Essays on the History and Archaeology of the Ancient Near East in Honour of J. Maxwell Miller, ed. J. A. Dearman and M. P. Graham (Sheffield: JSOT, 2001), 247.

4 Siegfried Herrmann, “The Devaluation of the Old Testament as a Historical Source,” in Israel’s Past in Present Research: Essays on Ancient Israelite Historiography, ed. V. Philips Long (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1993).

5 Enns, Inspiration and Incarnation: Evangelicals and the Problem of the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005).

6 Sparks, God’s Word in Human Words: An Evangelical Appropriation of Critical Biblical Scholarship (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008).

7 Barr, Fundamentalism (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1977).

8 Ibid., 131, his emphasis.

9 Sparks, God’s Word in Human Words, 145.

ABBREVIATIONS

AASOR

Annual of the American Schools of Oriental Research

AB

Anchor Bible

AION

Annali dell’Istituto Orientale di Napoli

AJA

American Journal of Archaeology

AnBib

Analecta biblica

ANET

Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Bible. 3rd ed. Edited by James B. Pritchard. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969

AnOr

Analecta orientalia

ANRW

Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung. Edited by H. Temporini and W. Haase. Berlin, 1972–

ANTF

Arbeiten zur neutestamentlichen Textforschung

AOAT

Alter Orient und Altes Testament

ARE

Ancient Records of Egypt. Edited by J. H. Breasted. 5 vols. Chicago, 1905–1907. Reprint, New York, 1962

ARM

Archives royales de Mari

AUSS

Andrews University Seminary Studies

BA

Biblical Archaeologist

Bapt.

Baptism (Tertullian)

BAR

Biblical Archaeology Review

BASOR

Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research

BBET

Beiträge zur biblischen Exegese und Theologie

BBR

Bulletin for Biblical Research

BBRSup

Bulletin for Biblical Research Supplement

BDAG

Bauer, W., F. W. Danker, W. F. Arndt, and F. W. Gingrich. Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature. 3rd ed. Chicago, 1999

BECNT

Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament

BibInt

Biblical Interpretation

BurH

Buried History

BWANT

Beiträge zur Wissenschaft vom Alten und Neuen Testament

BZAW

Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft

BZNW

Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft

CAH

Cambridge Ancient History

CANE

Civilizations of the Ancient Near East. Edited by J. Sasson. 4 vols. New York, 1995

CBQ

Catholic Biblical Quarterly

CBQMS

Catholic Biblical Quarterly Monograph Series

CBS

critical biblical scholarship

CHANE

Culture and History of the Ancient Near East

Civ.

The City of God (Augustine)

COS

The Context of Scripture. Edited by W. W. Hallo. 3 vols. Leiden, 1997–

CT

Cuneiform Texts from Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum

CTJ

Calvin Theological Journal

Dtr

Deuteronomist

EKK

Evangelisch-katholischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament

Ep. Afric.

Epistle to Africanus(Origen)

Ep. Orig.

Epistle to Origen (Julius Africanus)

ErIsr

Eretz-Israel

EvQ

Evangelical Quarterly

EvT

Evangelische Theologie

ExAud

Ex auditu

ExpTim

Expository Times

FLP

Tablets in the collections of the Free Library of Pennsylvania

FOTL

Forms of the Old Testament Literature

FRLANT

Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen Testaments

Hist. eccl.

Ecclesiastical History (Eusebius)

HKAT

Handkommentar zum Alten Testament

HS

Hebrew Studies

HSS

Harvard Semitic Studies

HUT

Hermeneutische Untersuchungen zur Theologie

ICC

International Critical Commentary

IEJ

Israel Exploration Journal

ITQ

Irish Theological Quarterly

JAOS

Journal of the American Oriental Society

JBL

Journal of Biblical Literature

JCS

Journal of Cuneiform Studies

JEA

Journal of Egyptian Archaeology

JEOL

Jaarbericht van het Vooraziatisch-Egyptisch Gezelschap (Genootschap) Ex oriente lux

JESHO

Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient

JETh

Jahrbuch für evangelikale Theologie

JETS

Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society

JHS

Journal of Hebrew Scriptures

JNES

Journal of Near Eastern Studies

JSJSup

Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Judaism

JSNTSup

Journal for the Study of the New Testament: Supplement Series

JSOT

Journal for the Study of the Old Testament

JSOTSup

Journal for the Study of the Old Testament: Supplement Series

JSS

Journal of Semitic Studies

JTS

Journal of Theological Studies

LÄ

Lexikon der Ägyptologie. Edited by W. Helck, E. Otto, and W. Westendorf. Wiesbaden, 1972

LXX

Septuagint

Mari

Mari: Annales de recherches interdisciplinaires

MDOG

Mitteilungen der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft

MT

Masoretic Text

NAC

New American Commentary

NCB

New Century Bible

NICNT

New International Commentary on the New Testament

NICOT

New International Commentary on the Old Testament

NIDOTTE

New International Dictionary of Old Testament Theology and Exegesis. Edited by W. A. VanGemeren. 5 vols. Grand Rapids, 1997

NIGTC

New International Greek Testament Commentary

NIVAC

NIV Application Commentary

NovT

Novum Testamentum

NPNF1

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1

NPNF2

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2

NRTh

La nouvelle revue théologique

NTL

New Testament Library

NTOA

Novum Testamentum et Orbis Antiquus

NTS

New Testament Studies

NTTS

New Testament Tools and Studies

OBO

Orbis biblicus et orientalis

OLA

Orientalia lovaniensia analecta

OTE

Old Testament Essays

OTG

Old Testament Guides

OTL

Old Testament Library

OTS

Old Testament Studies

OTT

Old Testament theology

PEQ

Palestine Exploration Quarterly

Prol. Sal.

Prologue to Sapientia Salomonis (Wisdom of Solomon) (Jerome)

PSB

Princeton Seminary Bulletin

RÄR

Reallexikon der ägyptischen Religionsgeschichte. H. Bonnet. Berlin, 1952

RB

Revue biblique

RBén

Revue bénédictine

RBL

Review of Biblical Literature

RelSRev

Religious Studies Review

RevQ

Revue de Qumran

RHR

Revue de l’histoire des religions

RlA

Reallexikon der Assyriologie. Edited by Erich Ebeling et al. Berlin, 1928–

RIMA

The Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia, Assyrian Periods

RNT

Regensburger Neues Testament

RS

Ras Shamra

RTR

Reformed Theological Review

SAA

State Archives of Assyria

SAAS

State Archives of Assyria Studies

SBLABS

Society of Biblical Literature Archaeology and Biblical Studies

SBLDS

Society of Biblical Literature Dissertation Series

SBLSymS

Society of Biblical Literature Symposium Series

SBLWAW

Society of Biblical Literature Writings from the Ancient World

SBS

Stuttgarter Bibelstudien

SC

Sources chrétiennes. Paris: Cerf, 1943–

SEÅ

Svensk exegetisk årsbok

SecCent

Second Century

SHANE

Studies in the History of the Ancient Near East

SJOT

Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament

SNTSMS

Society for New Testament Studies Monograph Series

SVTQ

St Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly

TA

Tel Aviv

TJ

Trinity Journal

TLZ

Theologische Literaturzeitung

TRE

Theologische Realenzyklopädie. Edited by G. Krause and G. Müller. Berlin, 1977–

TRev

Theologische Revue

TS

Theological Studies

TynBul

Tyndale Bulletin

UF

Ugarit-Forschungen

VE

Vox evangelica

VT

Vetus Testamentum

VTSup

Supplements to Vetus Testamentum

WBC

Word Biblical Commentary

WdF

Wege der Forschung

WMANT

Wissenschaftliche Monographien zum Alten und Neuen Testament

WTJ

Westminster Theological Journal

WUNT

Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament

WVDOG

Wissenschaftliche VerÖffentlichungen der deutschen Orientgesellschaft

YOSR

Yale Oriental Series, Researches

ZÄS

Zeitschrift für ägyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde

ZDPV

Zeitschrift des deutschen Palästina-Vereins

ZNW

Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft und die Kunde der älteren Kirche

ZTK

Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche

Part 1

BIBLICAL, SYSTEMATIC, AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY

1

RELIGIOUS EPISTEMOLOGY, THEOLOGICAL INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE, AND CRITICAL BIBLICAL SCHOLARSHIP

A Theologian’s Reflections

THOMAS H. MCCALL

Introduction

“Do you want us to listen to you?”1 Peter van Inwagen puts this question to contemporary mainstream New Testament scholarship. He makes clear just who he means by “you”: those who engage in historical-critical study of the New Testament, those who presuppose either a denial of “or neutrality about its authority, to investigate such matters as the authorship, dates, histories of composition, historical reliability and mutual dependency of the various books of the New Testament,” those who study the Bible by such methods as “source criticism, form criticism, and redaction criticism.”2 He also specifies just who he means by “us”: believing Christians who are not trained New Testament scholars but who regard the New Testament as historically reliable; “we” are “ordinary churchgoers” and “pastors who minister to the ordinary churchgoers,” as well as “theologians who regard the New Testament as an authoritative divine revelation.”3

Do you want us to listen to you? Van Inwagen asks this as a serious question, and he follows it with an equally serious argument for some surprising conclusions.

First, “ordinary” Christians (Christians not trained in New Testament scholarship) have grounds for believing that the gospel stories are (essentially) historical—grounds independent of the claims of historical scholarship. Secondly, New Testament scholars have established nothing that tells against the thesis that ordinary Christians have grounds independent of historical studies for believing in the essential historicity of the gospel stories. Thirdly, ordinary Christians may therefore ignore any skeptical historical claims made by New Testament scholars with a clear intellectual conscience.4

What van Inwagen says about New Testament studies may just as easily be extended to critical biblical scholarship (hereafter CBS) more generally.5 Many proponents of CBS may be surprised and puzzled by van Inwagen’s question, and may reply, “Of course we want you to listen to us. We expect you to listen to us, and any honest seeker of truth naturally will look to the experts in the field for information. If you want to know the sober truth of the important issues at stake, then of course you will listen to us. Indeed, failure to listen to us is evidence of noetic laziness (at best) or intellectual dishonesty (at worst).”

But what would prompt a question such as that of van Inwagen? What is it that drives arguments such as his? A well-respected analytic philosopher, van Inwagen is not known for intellectual laziness, and to dismiss his claims out of hand as “dishonest” would itself be both lazy and judgmental. Furthermore, he speaks for many honest Christians; his concerns are more representative of many Christians who think long and hard about these matters than they are idiosyncratic.

In this essay, I first offer a sketch of some important recent work in religious epistemology, work that has direct bearing upon the efforts of CBS—but work that is often not given sufficient consideration by the proponents of CBS. I then relate that work in religious epistemology to some relevant issues in CBS, and I briefly engage with the work of some representative proponents of it. I conclude, not with any kind of slam-dunk argument, but with some serious epistemological and theological reflections.

Important Work in Religious Epistemology: A Brief Overview of Some Recent Contributions

The last few decades have been particularly fruitful in discussions of religious epistemology. While the vast majority of what has taken place is beyond the scope of this discussion, several particularly important elements deserve mention. So while I make no pretense that what follows is anything more than the barest sketch of some of these developments, even such a brief overview will serve to highlight some of the most important of these aspects.

Justification in Religious Epistemology

The position often known as “classical foundationalism” (or, alternatively, “strong foundationalism”) has been prominent in many quarters. Often pictured as a pyramid of knowledge, this view (or family of views) holds that claims to knowledge that could count as truly justified are of two classes: either those that are properly foundational (or “basic”) or those that are appropriately structured upon the properly foundational beliefs. Beliefs that could count as genuinely foundational or properly basic are only those that are either self-evident (e.g., laws of logic and mathematics) or evident to the senses.6 So if a belief is really justified, it is so by virtue of being either self-evident or evident to the senses (if foundational), or appropriately built upon such beliefs. Any justified belief would meet one of these two conditions: it will either satisfy

(CF1) being either self-evident or evident to the senses;

or

(CF2) being appropriately structured upon such (CF1) beliefs.

Classical foundationalism has attracted much criticism, and, while it is not without contemporary defenders, it is safe to say that it is on the defensive. One of the main areas of criticism is that classical foundationalism’s criteria for justified belief simply cannot account for a great deal of what we (safely) take to be true. Is the world more than five minutes old? Are there other minds? Critics of classical foundationalism (Alvin Plantinga being among the most important and distinguished of these critics) argue that it is notoriously hard to account for such important—one might even wish to say basic—beliefs as these: surely the world is more than five minutes old, and surely solipsism is false, but it is hard to rule out such obviously erroneous beliefs on classical foundationalism. Classical foundationalism is also commonly charged with being self-referentially incoherent. Is classical foundationalism itself properly basic? If it is, then it must either be self-evident or evident to the senses. So is it self-evident? Not at all. Is it evident to the senses? Not at all. Well, then, is it appropriately built up from something that is self-evident or evident to the senses? Not obviously. But if it cannot satisfy its own stated conditions for justified belief, then it is self-referentially incoherent. Being self-referentially incoherent is not a virtue, and the continuing defenders of classical foundationalism generally recognize that they have work before them. Nicholas Wolterstorff goes so far as to conclude that “on all fronts foundationalism is in bad shape. It seems to me that there is nothing to do but give it up for mortally ill and learn to live in its absence.”7

If the future of classical foundationalism is less than bright, what other options are there? One of the main alternatives is coherentism.8 Coherentism eschews the picture of the pyramid of knowledge, and instead conceives of knowledge as more akin to a web or a raft.9 There are various versions of coherentism, but what they share in common is the notion that a belief B is justified if and only if it coheres with the other beliefs in the system or web of beliefs. Some of the beliefs in the web will be more central than others and vital to the strength or integrity of the raft or web, while others will be on the periphery and of less importance. These beliefs can be adjusted “on the move”; just as one might be able to replace a piece of a raft while floating on it (as long as it is not too large or central), so also beliefs may be added or dropped as their coherence with the rest of the system is tested. Is a belief B justified for someone? Well, there is a way to check: is it consistent with the other beliefs in the epistemic web?10 If the belief in question is not consistent, then it is not justified. If it is consistent, then it can count as a justified belief (and, of course, if it is a justified true belief, then it counts as genuine knowledge).11

Coherentism has also, however, come in for its share of powerful criticism.12 There are some common and powerful philosophical objections to coherentist theories of justification: as Plantinga argues (via his example of the “Epistemically Inflexible Climber”), coherence is not sufficient for justification. As engagement with any real “true believer” in a conspiracy theory shows, it is possible to have a very coherent set of beliefs while many of those beliefs are completely out of touch with reality. Nor is it clear that coherence is necessary for justification. Many people will admit that there are times in their lives when it is hard to make everything “add up,” yet we seem to have good reason to hold to all of these beliefs. While tight coherence might be desirable, to conclude that it is necessary for justification would threaten to rule out many beliefs that really belong. At any rate, coherentism makes it tough to choose between competing “webs” or traditions. As William P. Alston puts it, “Coherentism continues to be faced with the stubborn fact that, however the notion of coherence is spelled out, it seems clear that there is an indefinitely large multiplicity of equally coherent systems of belief, with no way provided by coherence theory for choosing between them.”13

So if classical foundationalism and coherentism are both in trouble, what other options are there? Some of the most interesting proposals on the contemporary scene are those of the modest foundationalists, the most interesting and influential of which is Plantinga’s “Reformed Epistemology.”14